


Chop Suey

by orphan_account



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Angst, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Bad Parenting, Bruises, Child Abandonment, Child Abuse, Child Neglect, Class Differences, Derogatory Language, Discrimination, Explicit Language, F/M, Gen, Heavy Angst, Homelessness, Humor, M/M, Overprotective Mikasa Ackerman, POV Third Person, Poverty, Pre-Slash, Prostitution, Sassy Levi (Shingeki no Kyojin), Slow Build, Slow Burn, Student Eren Yeager, Titan Shifters, Underage Smoking, Violence
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-04-20
Updated: 2015-05-25
Packaged: 2018-03-25 00:42:30
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 7,082
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3790240
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In which Eren is the teenage shifter who has a shitty home life, anger issues and a society that actually hates him (not in that order) and Levi is the older, badass cool kid with a penchant for smoking and not taking in strays. Unfortunately Eren happens to be the exception, when they meet one winter morning outside Trost High and Levi discovers to his dismay that he does have a heart...</p><p>But in a world where shifters are discriminated against and people from Levi's background are only ever going to go down, it's unlikely that either are going to make it very far. Really, it's just a matter of time.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

_Wake up_  
_Grab a brush put a little make-up  
_ _Hide the scars to fade away the shake-up_

Another night.

Cold and damp. The stone lay listless around him, dead and cold and damp, so heavy the very essence of it seeped into the air, so every time Eren breathed it in he was breathing thick mist and went down slow and ached up his lungs and shuddered around his heart.

He huddled. Breathed deep. Clenched his fists, tucked his arms around his legs, hands up into his knees, heart beating slow and viscous. Stared hard into the darkness. Sometimes it seemed like it would solidify, and then rear back and  _smash_ down on him and finally rid the world of another monstrosity—and other times it was just so terribly transparent and empty and the loneliness would bite deep at him, seeping cold into the shiver-thin of his bones—and yet other times it would pulse and beat around him, and he was in the stomach of a beast, just waiting to die.

He listened.

The beat of cold water through pipes overhead. Scratching in the walls, slipping around confusedly in pitch black hollows. The moans of some other wretched shifter next door, echoing through an overhead grate, the soft crooning whimpers on the opposite side. His breathing, soft and damp. Rough talk between the guards somewhere beyond his cell walls. A screech of sirens, ever so distant, a quiet whisper far, far away.

The beat of Eren's heart. It thumped and sent visceral shivers into the air that shuddered their way through droplets of moisture, physically beating into the air, the vibrations tangible and loud to that sense Eren had just under his skin. Eren closed his eyes and fell into the beating of it, and it was like the tick of a clock or fall of rain or the rise of the sun, in the way it was steady and true and good.

Eren coughed harsh. His hand came away darker than black where drops of blood hit and fled the trembling branches of his fingers, and his lungs and throat burnt cold. He coughed again and doubled over and shut his eyes tight because it  _hurt—_

Think of something good, Eren thought, so he thought of Armin. Armin with his words of getting free and windswept beaches where they'd spend their days, without Eren in shackles and bruises, and Armin with his blonde hair and kind hands and way of stepping that said, I'm sorry, I'm sorry it's like this. And—Mikasa, tall and firm and protective, beautiful and wild and angry, the way her eyes would narrow when he came to school tomorrow with too-fast flinches and haunted eyes, the way she'd swear revenge of the guards and promise Eren he'd never hurt again (the only promise she ever broke) and the way she stepped, angry at the world, defiant, not caring that all it would amount to was ashes in the ground and on the air.

Eren coughed and swore,  _fuck,_ loudly. He hunched and shivered miserably. Wiped his eyes.

(he fell asleep eventually and dreamed: eren dreamed, like this—transforming, the pain and blood mixing to roar him up, squashing all those painful agonizing humans like little pathetic flies stomping through town swallowing screaming mothers fathers children

but dying free)

**000000000**

Levi's mother was beautiful. Even in the smoky gloom of her rundown apartment, even with a client old and fat and sleeping in the bed behind her, even with her makeup dripping and hunger gnawing at the dark shadowed contours of her skin, and even with the rot setting into her very soul that came from living from like this—even with that, she was beautiful. "Levi!" she said, in surprise, seeing him leaning at the doorway. "Didn't hear you come in. Hungry?"

"I'm fine," Levi said blankly, taking a drag of his cigarette and letting it out in a thin stream of white smoke. "Put some clothes on, Mom."

His mom looked round, her shirt open to show her concaved stomach and scarred ribs and ripped bra, her skirt skittering down the bony hollow of her left hip. She looked up at him, gleamed an embarrassed smile, her teeth yellow with two decades of nicotine addiction, and spun unsteadily to gather a better outfit. "Put a meal in the microwave," she instructed, glancing askew at her client.

Levi left for the kitchen. There was no meal to put in the microwave.

She came in smiling, said, "Levi, I got a client here—"

"I saw," he said dryly. "But the party got cancelled, so I came home."

"One of your friends—?"

He interrupted her smoothly, "I knew you wouldn't even give up one client for me to have a place to sleep."

She looked at him. The sadness filled the emptiness behind her eyes but didn't quite mask the absence of a soul, before spilling out and gleaming silver down her used face, showing a mockery of a person in the shadows under her eyelashes. Levi stood mute. He never knew what to do when she cried. Never knew what to do when anyone cried.

He took a drag and concentrated on the acrid burn.

"Levi—" she stumbled barefoot, arms outstretched. "Levi, baby, I know I'm a shit mother."

He waited. Breathed out smoke. She waited, and breathed out tears, a doll with paint rolling slow and practiced down her face.

"I'm  _trying,_ " she finished. "I'll take tomorrow off. We can watch a movie together, okay?"

What she meant was, Levi would have to get a pirated movie off the 'net and hook it up to the screen via HDMI cable and they'd both watch and smoke the crackly playback through a half rate internet connection and not talk at all, until Levi's mother would get a call and she'd become one of them again—someone 'facing their responsibilities, either on their backs or on their knees—there are ladies who just simply freeze and  _dare not_ turn away'.

"Yeah, whatever," Levi said. He cocked his head. "Sounds like your damn gentl'man is waking up. Gonna go cater for him or not?"

"Where are you going to go?"

Oh,  _now_ she was concerned.

"There's a 24 hour cafe opened up near school," Levi said. "Give me some money an' I'll spend the night there."

She flinched automatically at the mention of money, before letting out a bone-deep sigh and spinning to the counter to produce a crumpled wad of bills. Levi felt dirty even touching them.

"Goodbye, sweetie," she said, kissing him on the cheek with painted lips. "I'll see you tomorrow."

"Bye," Levi returned automatically. He swept up his school bag and took from the wall the charger for his phone—he'd need it, if he was gonna do an all nighter—then pulled on a thick coat. Judging by the sleet they'd had this morning and the grey skies all day, tonight and tomorrow were going to be bitterly cold.

Levi didn't hurry down the three flights of stairs to ground floor and relished in the warmth. The shady folks who were a staple of that neighbourhood and shouted drunkenly from the shadows as he walked down were the reason he couldn't just spend the night on the steps, but didn't attack him on his walk down from the glint of the knife at his hip.

Once Levi got out of his neighbourhood and into a nicer one—where most of his friends lived, being annoying rich bastards—he stashed the knife back in his bag; he wouldn't need it here, even at the late hour, as the police walked by in patrols every so often. Levi stepped on, smoking a fag to stay warm from the ice air, his shadow erratic and honey coloured bathed in tall streetlights and the colour from shut windows spilling into the street. The houses and cars parked outside got progressively nicer as he walked in the direction of school, until every other one was gated and there wasn't an apartment block to be seen.

He turned left down into the shopping centre. It was buzzing quietly with couples enjoying a late night out and some harried shoppers, but most shops were closed and the stalls desolate. The shop bell jingled as he entered Cafe-by-the-Sea (they were nowhere near the coast) and two single patrons looked up from their coffees, instinctively turning noses up at Levi's ripped up jeans and lit fag.

Levi sneered at them, but stubbed out the smoke.

**000000000**

Eren woke up, from those shadowy disturbed dreams, like this:

"Get the fuck out, shifter!" shouted the guard, hefting water sloshing cold ice in a rusted bucket. Someone had turned the lights on in the corridor, and they washed in cracked and yellow. Eren blinked into them, shuddering breaths waking him up into renewed coldness and a body that ached like it had been torn apart and remade, a cycle constantly rebounding in one swoop night.

"Wait," Eren croaked to the guard, and rolled over to put his arms over his head, a second before the deluge of hard water cascaded harsh over him. Eren was a statue, and the ice smashed him in one fell blow, and now he was mirror-shards glinting and screaming on the dirt-smeared floor while the guard looked down his boot and laughed and laughed and laughed at the last of the water trickled cold to the floor.

"Get up, shifter," the guard scowled, after a moment, and kicked him heavy in the ribs. "No breakfast. No shower. Time to move the fuck on."

Eren clenched his teeth to prevent whimpering. His mind was a mass of shivering cold, black dissolving the edges of his vision and it was all he could do to curl and protect from further assaults. The guard grunted and threw the bucket across the cell—Eren flinched—then told him curtly, "Five minutes!" before storming out.

Not gonna cry, Eren thought to himself, fighting back the cold and the fear and the pain with that constant shouting rage always at his core, burning him up. He struggled to a stand, and wiped his eyes and shook to dislodge pieces of ice, then seared the guard's bearded face in his head as one more person to hate.

The list was a long one.

He fumbled to the other side of the cell, searching with frozen fingers for the change of clothes balled up there he'd bought down last night. Shivering frantically, he stripped off his jacket, shirt, jeans and underwear, leaving them in a sopping pile behind him and pulled on the change of clothes.

Eren coughed. The sound reverberated and thudded hard into his lungs. He bought up the rage and screamed it out with a fist almost thudding to the wall, driving back any hot-ache salt tears that threatened to crack themselves out.

The guard came back, and stood threateningly, a shadowed blue eyed silhouette watching with arms crossed and lips twitching into a mocking smile. Eren resisted the urge to shoulder past him, and maybe swing a hook into his  _smug fucking face—_ but instead walked stiltedly through the gap the guard left and not react to the slap to his back that the man pushed him on with.

 _I will kill you,_ he promised the guard.  _Someday. Someday, I'll get you all._

(the defiance lasted all the way to the street—)

and Eren stood, in the cold, nothing but a cotton t-shirt and ripped jeans in a city teetering on the brink of winter. He took a breath and held it so he wouldn't cough, but the itch exploded painfully out of his throat and he doubled over, reflexive tears panicking down the scrapes of his face, everything amplified in the dead quiet of the street. The building he lived in loomed behind, and disappeared when he turned the corner.

The sun wasn't set to rise for another couple hours. Eren stared resolutely away from the cobwebbed streetlights teetering along his path, instead watching his sneakers drag across the stone and the way his shadow danced, flickering and graceful and strange in the way it existed in one moment and was gone the next, the only flighty being he could rely on.

Cars ricocheted louder as he approached the main road. Eren turned left and right again, seeking aimlessly a place to rest but scared that if he sat down, the cold would gnaw to his bones and he'd shatter again, or at the very least choke on his lungs as the abomination that was his body finally gave up to distort and devour him.

Mikasa's voice said, stop, you're not an abomination, and the rows of guards smoke louder, with their heavy fists and buckets of ice, saying yes, yes you are. And the teachers at school leaned against their human students and looked disgustedly down their pretty noses and said yes, yes you are. And Eren's parents, shadowed mushy figures with faces shredded by time, tore away from him with screams rising from their lips and tears falling from their eyes and said, yes, yes you most certainly are and  _we don't want you._

And Eren ignored them all and walked faster, faster, past shadowy gaping mouths of alleys and closed windows of warm homes, the hate and rage thudding through his veins, as vital as blood because without any of it he'd be a puppet with his strings cut.

He decided to make his way to school. Trost High was an hour's walk from where he lived _,_ on the right side of the tracks, in neighbourhoods with white-picket fences and perfect families and on the edge of mansions towering with gated fields and fluttering money. He walked it slow—he was still aching from a boot to the ribs, an ice shower and night on stone—and knew that when he got there, he'd have nothing to do but sit and wait for school to start.

Birds fled overhead.

Eren looked up, looked down. Paced onwards. He imagined the birds to be vultures, imagined them to be fleeing from site of savagery to the next massacre on the horizon, imagined the plucking at flesh with their beaks and clawing out eyeballs to pop and drizzle high in reflective rays.

Eren turned right and started uphill.

He thought of Mikasa and Armin. They'd practically grown up together, the three of them—Mikasa and Eren had met in between foster homes, two dirty orphans with loneliness sunk deep into their bones. They'd scrambled through back alleys and atop low roofs together, and that one time—with the men and the van and Mikasa, her eyes wide and glazed, the thick set men grasping her wrist and leading her away, and Eren so angry he couldn't breathe and screaming and whirling like a madmen, and dragging her to safety—that time had made them closer than siblings, cemented the bond.

They didn't live together, of course. Eren to a predictable line of adults who passed him on and on and on and Mikasa to rich parents who didn't like it when Eren visited. The two had met up every chance they could get, and it was there they saved little blonde Armin from swaggering rich bullies in the perfect grass of a local park, and then they went to school together, and it was like fate.

-Eren turned the corner. Trost High looked over from a street over, and he clambered up steps and settled down, to huddle and wait.

**000000000**

Seven hours later and Levi had fallen asleep thirteen times—a sneering pierced barista shook him awake and informed him curtly they didn't cater to the homeless; they kicked him out at five in the morning. Levi slammed the door on his way out and stormed a little while, then almost fell asleep again— _despite_ an odd dozen coffee's worth of caffeine flowing through his veins—when he stopped to light another fag. Eventually he made it near his school, and spat a curse when he checked the time and saw it was only half five.

Someone coughed behind him.

Levi wheeled—sitting on the steps there was a scrawny kid, all messy black hair and lightly tanned skin, in a shirt and jeans so thin they looked they might blow away. He was doubled over and coughing painfully, and when he finished and noticed Levi staring at him he flinched backwards.

Levi said, scathingly, "Why the fuck haven't you got a coat on? It's practically winter, you shitty brat. Why d'ya think you've got that fucking cough, huh?"

The kid shrugged, his bony shoulders jutting up and face falling down in that familiar way that meant,  _I haven't got a coat._ Levi scowled and took a drag of his smoke irritably as an annoying wave of sympathy curdled in his gut. "What the fuck are you even dong here so early, huh," Levi muttered, making it more of a statement then a question as he turned away.

As expected, the kid didn't answer but offered, "I'm Eren," after a few silent beats.

"Did I ask your name?" Levi asked, eyebrow raised.

The kid scowled, all lit green eyes and furious snarl. So he  _did_ have a backbone. "I'm following  _social norms,_ dickhead," he spat.

"Complicated words," Levi smirked. "Do you even know what they mean?"

"Don't treat me like everyone else, like you're better than me," Eren snarled. "You're not even richer than me. You're so full of bullshit."

Levi conceded that, and was about to reply when the kid took a too-deep breath of the ice air and lurched forwards into another coughing fit. Levi couldn't help wincing. It sounded like something was trying to tear itself out of the kid's throat, and when he was finished he collapsed back onto the steps and shivered miserably, wiping droplets of blood of his chin and staring shamefully at the pavement.

"For fuck's sake," Levi scowled. He strode forwards, dropping the cig and peeling off his coat in one smooth motion. He threw the coat at the kid, who caught it and stared bewildered.

"What do you want me to do with this?"

"Are you serious?" Levi asked with incredulity. "Put it on!"

"Why?" Eren scowled, fists clenching as if Levi was starting a fight.

"Because you look too pitiful for me not to do something about it, brat. Petra would hound me too much if I let you cough yourself to death."

"'Petra' wouldn't find out," Eren pointed out.

"Stop being so damned thick and put the coat on before I smash your face into the ground," Levi said through grit teeth.

The kid went silent. He put the coat on, and huddled into it with a sigh. "Thanks," he said, after a moment.

"He has manners!" Levi announced to the world in general, with disbelief.

"You don't need to be a jerk," Eren scowled.

"I'm not being a jerk, I just gave you my motherfucking coat."

Eren bit his lip and Levi smirked. He bought out a lighter and lit another cigarette, taking a drag and watching the thin stream go up into the first weak rays of a winter sun.

"What's the time?" Eren asked.

"Fuck if I know," Levi snorted, and then, "Quarter to."

"Quarter to what?"

"Quarter to six, obviously. How long have you been out here?"

Eren shrugged. "Since... I dunno. I got kicked out at four, an' then it musta taken me an hour to walk here, so... a couple hours."

"You've been sitting out here a couple hours? No wonder you got a cough, idiot."

"Nah," Eren said casually. "I had this yesterday. It probably just got worse 'cause of this morning, but it'll heal."

"What happened this morning?" Levi couldn't help asking. Eren shuttered, so he graciously changed the subject—"You go to Trost High?"

"Yeah!" Eren brightened. "I actually got accepted! Do you go there?"

"Yah," Levi said shortly. He wasn't surprised at Eren's enthusiasm—it took a lot of work to be accepted into Trost High, which was one of the most prestigious high schools out there with fierce competition for spaces.

Levi turned away and took a drag of his smoke. Eren's stomach growled audibly, and he flushed.

Levi sighed, and mentally cursed Petra for somehow slicing him open and inserting a heart. "Eat your lunch," he instructed.

"They didn't let me—I mean. I forgot to bring it."

Levi didn't ask who 'they' was. "What, you're going hungry 'til dinner?"

Eren ducked his head. "I—uh. I'm not getting dinner. Tonight."

Levi frowned. He didn't ask why, because he knew the kid would clam up, and said irritably, "One meal a day ain't enough, brat."

Eren looked down shamefully.

"What?" Levi snapped.

Eren mumbled something.

"Speak up."

"I didn't. Have anything this morning."

"You're not eating all day?" Levi said, letting astonishment leak into his tone. "What kind of motherfuckers do you have for parents?" Eren didn't respond—not that Levi expected him to—and Levi irritably changed the subject. "Smoke?" he offered.

"I'm good," Eren refused tiredly. "Already got a cough."

"I can hear," Levi said, and took a drag.


	2. Chapter 2

_I don't think you trust_  
In my self-righteous suicide  
I cry when angels deserve to die

They didn't meet again until lunch. The meantime was like this—

Eren traipsed into first period, slumping into the back seat next to Mikasa who shook back a wave of black hair and asked in a whisper; "Why didn't you call?"

Eren shrugged and turned studiously away from her gaze, setting on the teacher who had already delved into the roles of neurones in the central nervous system. Mikasa punched him hard under the desk, and he collapsed in with a soft groan of pain, reflexive tears springing to his eyes. Mikasa pulled back with a slight gasp and said harshly out the corner of her mouth, "What did you do this time?"

"It wasn't fucking me," Eren said slightly, breathing through the pain and prodding his ribs to see if they'd cracked yet. A cough scrambled out of his lungs and he turned away to muffle it in his elbow.

"It never is, is it?" she scowled, and opened her book when the teacher looked over. "What happened?"

"Uh. Back chatted some dickhead guard last night. Ducked his punch."

"And?"

"In the cell for the night..." he answered, dismally, and coughed again; his throat ripped bloodily with the force of it and he barely managed not to double over.

"Eren," she said, and he felt the pity swollen and bloated in her words. He flinched away from it, drawing Levi's coat closer around him.

"What time did they kick you out?" she asked him, sideways, accustomed to the punishments of Shiganshina Prison after two years of her best friend staying there.

"Early," Eren sighed, not wanting to get into specifics, not wanting more of that swollen bloated pity rotting out her voice. "Before dawn."

"And?"

"Kicked me a couple times," he coughed again, ignored her look. "In the ribs."

"You need a hospital?"

"No," he said, hurried. The last time had been bad enough, and Mikasa knew it so she didn't press.

"Your cold's gotten worse," she observed.

"Hasn't," Eren coughed.

"Where did you get the coat?"

"Uh. Some guy. This morning?"

She frowned. "Who?"

"Levi... Ackerman?"

"Eren," she said. "He's bad news."

"Leave it, Mikasa," Eren rolled his eyes.

"No, seriously."

This time he welcomed the roar of sweet hot rage that tore through his veins and sparked harshly in scraped up the inside of his face, and eyes bright he growled, " _Leave it,_ Mikasa."

And the teacher said, "Yaeger, no talking!"

"I wasn't," Eren gritted his teeth, turning on her, eager for an argument.

"What is the role of a sensory neurone, Yaeger?" she said in a sneer. The class turned, two dozen eyes alight for entertainment. Mikasa tried to whisper something to him.

"No fuckin' idea, Miss," Eren said, grinning viciously. "An' you already gave me detention yesterday."

She smiled at him in mock grace, and Mikasa sighed out loud next to him, and the class sat straight with anticipation. This was a game all players knew well. "Stay behind after class, Yaeger."

"I'll think about it," Eren said, turning away to cough, rage abating momentarily at the pure pain which savaged up and receded only with an indrawn breath and clenched fists from Eren.

The teacher went back to teaching. Mikasa said, "You didn't have to do that."

"You know they hate me," Eren said. "Why should I roll over for them?"

"It's not fair," she said as viciously as him.

"Yeah, Mikasa," he said. "It's really not, is it?"

**0000000**

Whereas Levi—

"Erwin, come on. It's chemistry. Neither of us are dumb enough to suffer from missing one class of fucking chemistry."

"I'm not ditching with you, Levi," Erwin sighed, straight backed and stately.

"I will!" Hange said brightly, stepping in beside him. "Are we smoking in the closet?"

"On the bleachers," Levi corrected with a savage grin. "Bye, Erwin."

"Levi," Erwin started. "I'm not covering for you."

"Yeah, you are," Levi grinned. "We're besties. See you in history."

Erwin rolled his eyes and sighed, while Hange took Levi around the wrist and led him through the stream of students rushing to first class and out into the crisp cold air hanging over the bleachers. They settled on the top row, back to corrugated metal, and Levi flicked his lighter to catch the end of a cigarette. He gave it to Hange and lit one for himself, taking a long drag and letting the grey filter out trough his lips and dissipate in thin colourless wisps.

"So," Hange said, excitable as usual.

"Give me five minutes of silence, shitty glasses," Levi yawned, turning away from her glints of round luminous circles and choppy brown bangs. He stared out into the horizon, a built up city receding into the distance, the glint of something misty just beyond the line of smoke. He took another drag, had a faraway notion of relishing the burn, imagined pressing the hot end to his wrist and seeing if it hurt. Imagined feeling alive. Or feeling—anything but this grey faraway boring wash of life, days receding, preceding, as if he was watching through glass and touching without feeling and so totally incomprehensibly irrevocably  _perfectly_ flawlessly numb that there was nothing that could possibly hurt of him, and if he was rotting away on the inside from smoke and ash and tar, then—

"Levi, quit spacing out," Hange said, nudging him.

"Sorry," Levi yawned again, breathing out smoke. "Long day."

"Yes? Did your mom kick you out again?"

"Yah. Whole night." He glanced at her sideways. "Don't tell Erwin."

"No, I won't," she said, and changed the subject. "Who was that pretty boy you walked in with?"

Levi rolled his eyes. "Some scrappy kid I met outside. No one important."

"He was wearing your coat," Hange observed, uncharacteristically subdued in that way that meant she was trying to get answers.

"He looked like he'd had a fucked up night, I took pity. Petra rubbing off on me."

"Mm hm."

"What the fuck does that mean?"

"Nothing!" she said, and stubbed out the cigarette.

"Hey," Levi scowled. "I wouldn't have given it to you if you weren't gonna smoke it properly."

"I was trying it. Research purposes."

"God, what this time? Wait. No. Don't tell me."

She pouted. "Are you sure? It's really interesting."

"Yeah, I'm fucking sure," Levi scowled.

They sat in silence for another couple minutes, and then Hange said, "You know you can come round mine. Sometimes. Instead of spending the night on the streets."

"I wasn't on the streets, I was in a cafe."

"Whatever. Either way, you look like shit. And Erwin noticed."

"He did?" Levi frowned, sitting up straight.

"Uh huh. He had that concerned oh poor Levi looks like shit whatever can I do frown on his face again."

"He did not," Levi scowled.

"He did. And you have a crush on him."

"I do  _not,"_ Levi spat. "Shut up, Hange."

"Alright," she sang.

"And I'm not coming round yours. Your parents hate me."

"Everyone's parents hate you," she laughed. "Especially Erwin's."

"Stop doing that," Levi scowled, again.

"Doing what?"

"Making these annoying cryptic comments that probably have some double meaning you want me to hear that I'm not fucking hearing."

"Okay, fine," Hange said brightly. "Let's talk about Eren."

"Eren?" Levi pretended obliviousness.

"Mm hm. The boy with your coat."

"Why did you ask me about him if you know him?" Levi scowled.

"I don't know him, I know  _of_ him. And I was seeing what you said."

"Know of him? What does that mean?"

"Eren—Eren's an interesting kid, that's all."

"Interesting, that's one way of looking at it." Levi said in undertone.

"So you noticed too?" Hange said brightly, sitting up.

Levi took a drag, blew it out in her face. She hit him irritably in the leg, and Levi said irritably, "Noticed what?"

"That he's different. To us. Well, to us as in most of this school, but not—you. He's like you, isn't he?"

"What, poor?" Levi laughed drily. "Yeah, but that's not exactly something you need great deduction skills to work out. He was wearing a ripped shirt and jeans this morning and can't afford lunch, for god's sake."

"Do not take the lord's name in vain," Hange intoned, because she sometimes got stuck on little details like that. "And I didn't mean he's poor. I mean there's something—wrong with him."

"What, are you saying that there's something wrong with me?" Levi scowled.

"Levi," she said. "Yes."

"What?"

"Well. Your mother's a prostitute."

Levi stood up and walked away, and Hange shouted after him, " _Levi_! I didn't mean it like that!"

He ignored her.

"Levi," she said, catching up with him, and he walked faster, exiting the bleachers and stepping fast across the wide expanse of empty dew wet field. "You know I say things bluntly. I wouldn't know what tact was if it hit me in the face, remember?" which was a quote from their last argument, but Levi didn't laugh.

"Alright, Hange, I fucking know you don't have social skills," Levi scowled. "I'm going to chemistry. Erwin's probably missing me."

"Levi," she said, and he stalked away.

**0000000**

And Eren stood in front of Miss Greenfield's desk, slouching, ugly scowl on his face.

"Yaeger," she said, unsmiling. "Would you like to explain why you were talking while I was today?"

"I know all the stuff," Eren grinned.

"You know what neurones are? Go on, Yaeger, explain."

Eren shrugged. "They do shit to you."

"Eloquent," she smiled. "Detention, tomorrow."

"Original," he smiled back.

"Yaeger," she said in a disappointed sigh.

And Eren saw in a moment of clarity. He was away from his body, looking down on the scene—ragged skinny boy in a too big coat, dirt smeared on his cheeks and a cough ravaging up the inside of his bruised ribs, a monster lying just beneath his skin, and the teacher, sitting legs crossed and blonde hair slick. He could see both their lives preceding and receding like blackened endlessly stepped trails, and Eren's life went so clearly he almost couldn't breathe, because there it was, a past glinting in vivid details of his parents, and the way they didn't want him, and their faces he didn't remember. And Armin and Mikasa, friends with him only out of habit, destined for better things, both so brilliantly far away from what he was and it was only a matter of time before they left him. And his rows of angry bruising foster homes and then his deposition into prison and his endless cold days on the streets because he had nowhere to go. And here was his future, stretching out in the same impeccable detail; maybe a couple more miserable years before he dropped out of school, and then it was either the start of his adult life hungry on the streets or lonely in a prison, and then it was either a death on his feet with a knife in his hands or death in some alley and so desperately alone.

All this was clear, and he saw it in one diamond clear moment; and there, too, was Miss Greenfield's life, behind her privilege and glittering ecstasy, maybe a tragedy in the form of a grandmother dying, and that was all the pain she had and would ever feel; born middle class, a childhood playing in fields, an adulthood of handsome boyfriends and then a husband and a great job and wonderful children stretching right out in front of her as her clichéd future. She was young yet, maybe twenty three, twenty four, but by that time Eren would be dead and she still had her whole life and that was the difference between them. But the similarity that they shared and that everyone shared was that they both had this life, this life they were born into and that was set out from them and there was no straying from this path that was not already ordained and no escaping the spiral—downwards or upwards or otherwise—that was destined from them right from fucking birth. Right when Miss Greenfield was born to a loving family and right when Eren was born with genes all twisted and warped that meant he would be hated by society as long as he lived and long after.

Eren, saw, too, the game that they all played, and every single move everyone would make. Here in that very slight stilted moment between teacher and student was a conversation played out so endlessly it was almost tiresome reciting the words, hearing the echoed response, making the required motions, following everything by script, and Jesus fucking Christ it was killing him.

Literally.

Eren thought of the teacher saying,  _why must you act like this, Yaeger,_ and then he would say,  _like what, Miss,_ and then maybe she would say  _don't play games,_ and there would be irony in that because this whole fucking facade was a game—and then Miss Greenfield interrupted him by leaning forwards and flicking her blonde wave of hair back (just like Mikasa) and finishing, in a gust of ever-so-disappointed breath, and a downwards tilt of lightly painted eyes, "Why must you act like this, Yaeger?"

Eren thought,  _like what, Miss_ again, and then what? Then,  _don't play games,_ again, maybe with a tut, maybe a shake of her head.

Eren exhaled in disgust at himself that he might have thought any different. "Like what, Miss?"

"Don't play games, Yaeger," she said, shaking her head.

"Play games," Eren repeated mockingly under his breath. He almost couldn't stand it. He could feel the very air killing him, poisoning him, everything so dead and stifling it was hard to breathe let alone stand let alone play along with this endless spinning drearily concordant game.

He thought,  _hah, but you hate me, Miss._

"Do you think I hate you, Yaeger?"

"Hah," he said, struggling to choke the words out, desperate to stop himself, desperate to escape. "But. You hate me, Miss."

 _I hate you?,_ and she would raise an eyebrow, mocking him, taking amusement from this dumb fool creature slouching in front of her and dipping momentarily into her perfect cliché life.  _Why would you think that, Yaeger?_

 _We both know, Miss,_ he would say, referring to the monster, lying just under his skin, and he would cough and it would tear up out of him and tiredness and pain would ravage him together, and he'd be so terrifyingly lonely.

"I hate you, Yaeger?" Miss Greenfield said, interrupting him again. Eren wanted to punch her. His fists clenched, and she tittered a little at this dumb fool creature slouching in front of her, and she raised both carefully plucked painted eyebrows. "I hate you. Now why would you think that, Yaeger?"

"We both know, Miss."

His fists relaxed. Numbness overwhelmed him, terrifying in the way it was so dreadfully lonely.

"If you're referring to the fact you are a shifter, you're wrong."

_I'm wrong._

He was wrong.

"I'm wrong?"

"You're wrong," she nodded, and her blonde hair bounced. "I don't hate you at all, Yaeger, I'm just doing my job," and here Eren thought  _and it is not my fault if your behaviour keeps interrupting the class and I have to punish you for that,_ and exactly as he though it she finished, "and it is not my fault if your behaviour keeps interrupting the class and I have to punish you for that."

Eren was going to be sick.

Maybe he stood there a beat too long, swaying in sickness, in numbness, the monster suppressed and growling under his skin, and this beat too long interrupted the game and fate sat up and took interest and the juxtaposition going on—for in one world, the correct world, there was Eren shouting back something and the teacher reprimanding him and giving him week long detention and Eren stalking away and going to his next lesson, but in this world the game had been interrupted, and he was standing and swaying and the teacher didn't know what to do and he didn't know what to do and it all felt as if it was falling apart.

He realised in muted horror he was crying.

"Yaeger?" the teacher said, confusion in her voice where in the correct world, juxtaposed over this one, there was meant to be anger.

"Don't call me that," he managed to spit, and wiped the tears away angrily.

"Yaeger? What should I call you, then?"

"Eren. No, don't bother. Just call me what you think of me. Shifter scum, or fucking brat, or waste of life, or whatever. Everyone else does."

"Yaeger," she said, and maybe she heard something in his voice that was so wretched she couldn't help but take pity.

Like all of them fucking took pity.

And she corrected herself, "Eren. Eren, I think you need to sit down."

He did sit down, but only because he might collapse if he didn't.

"What's wrong with you?" she said, but quietly, and not in the accusing way that it might normally be said.

"Shit," Eren said, and breathed out deep. He coughed painfully and doubled over.

"Are you sick? Shall I take you to the school nurse?"

"No," Eren said, frightened, and turned away to cough again. "No, Miss."

"Are you okay?" she asked. Eren didn't know what to say, completely thrown off course by those words, because this was meant to be a five minute shouting match ending in the correct way of him with detention and her going on to mark a stack of papers.

"I need to go," Eren panicked, and scraped up to make a headway for the closed door.

"Yae—Eren, wait. Sit down."

He sat, again, and this time it was because she told him to, because he didn't know what else to do.

"You can talk to me. What's going on?"

He coughed.

"Is it something happening at home?"

"Home," he laughed, and had to shut his eyes to stop himself from crying again. "I haven't got a home."

"What?" she frowned. "Where are your parents?"

Eren shrugged. "I haven't seen them in ten years, so you tell me. Miss."

"They're dead?"

Eren shrugged and stayed silent, trying to breathe deep and get back control of himself. Of the situation.

"Where are you staying? With foster parents?"

"Nah. Shiganshina Prison for Adult Shifters."

"What?"

He sighed. "It's 'sposed to be on my file. You should know."

She ignored him. "Why are you staying in an adult prison?"

He shrugged. "System's overfull. Us shifter kids are the lowest of the low, so when there's no space for us at foster homes they stick us in spare rooms at shifter prisons. Justification is the guards there know how to deal with shifters, and you only go there if you're a 'troubled' motherfucker, so—" he spat a laugh, realising he was talking too much, and shrank into himself.

"No one's looking after you?"

There. Shit. That was pity. Eren didn't even know if it was worse than disgust, but at least he was used to disgust, and this added pity was like a shock to the system.

_Fuck._

"I need to get out of here," he said again, and he left, and Miss Greenfield didn't try and stop him and he ran straight to next lesson (where Mr Salvor gave him detention for being late) and the world sighed as everything fell clicking back into place.

**0000000**

Levi slammed his tray down next to Erwin. Petra lifted her head off her folded arms and said, "Levi, hey!"

"Hi, Petra," he said. "Hi, Erwin. Mike, Dita," he greeted the rest of his friends, and pointedly ignored Hange.

"Mature, Levi," she laughed, throwing a grape at him. He caught it, and stared at her, and crushed the grape, then threw the pulp and the juice into her face and moved next to Petra so further away from Erwin.

"Did you have an argument?" Erwin asked, looking between them.

"A slight disagreement over my misuse of words," Hange said.

"Over your inability to know what normal conversation is and how to interact  _not_ like a freak."

"A freak," she scowled. "Wow. Name calling. I'm so hurt, shortie."

"Bitch," he seethed.

"Levi," Petra frowned, and turned to Hange. "Hange, stop provoking him."

"I need to categorize his reactions," Hange explained. "It's for research."

"Fuck you," Levi scowled, calmly, and started eating his lunch. He remembered Eren and scanned the canteen for the kid, then caught sight of him on the other side of the crowded room on a long table, talking to a blond boy and dark haired girl.

He stood up and picked up his apple as he left the table.

"Levi," Hange frowned, but he ignored her and weaved through the crowds to Eren.

"Levi?" Eren said, looking up.

"Hey, brat," Levi scowled. "Have an apple."

"What?" Eren said, and his two friends looked up suspiciously. Levi ignored them and dropped an apple in front of Eren.

"Give me back the coat tomorrow," he ordered, and turned on his heel, and stalked away.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Kudos and comments if you enjoyed! And thanks for all the ones from last chapter, I loved hearing from you guys.

**Author's Note:**

> Title and lyrics from System of a Down. Read the tags. if you enjoyed, leave kudos and comment! :)


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